Doctors to answer reader questions about vaccine
Tribune, U. of C. to hold event on Facebook Live
Hospitals around the world are getting ready to begin their own COVID-19 vaccination campaigns at the same time Illinois health officials announced more than 9,000 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and surpassing more than 14,000 deaths. As people volunteer for local COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials, many concerns keep rising: Is taking the vaccine early an acceptable risk? If I’m predisposed to allergic reactions, should I avoid the Pfizer vaccine?
The Chicago Tribune is partnering with the University of Chicago to answer readers’ questions with a Facebook Live event on Monday, Dec. 14. Chicago Tribune editor Ariel Cheung will be asking those questions to University of Chicago Medicine infectious diseases expert Dr. Emily Landon.
Landon leads the University of Chicago’s academic health system’s infection control and prevention efforts. As the medical specialist for the High-Consequence Pathogen Preparedness Program, she has helped steer University of Chicago Medicine and its affiliates through the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to her current pandemic work, Landon is a medical ethicist at theMac-Lean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics and a researcher who focuses on the appropriate use of antibiotics and other antimicrobials, as well as the best ways to protect patients from health care-associated infections. Since the start of the pandemic, Landon has routinely spoken about COVID-19 at press events and has advised businesses and government officials on how to best respond to the global crisis.
On Wednesday, Dec. 16, reporter Darcel Rockett will talk with twin physicians Dr. Brittani James (family practitioner) and Dr. Brandi Jackson (psychiatrist) in another Facebook Live event — one that will focus on COVID-19 vaccinations and the Black community, from health inequities to the mistrust that exists between the community and the health care industry. Both events will take place at 12:30 p.m.
James is an assistant professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Illinois Hospital and Health Sciences System. Jackson is the director of Integrative Behavioral Health at Howard Brown Health Center, the largest provider of LGBTQ-focused health care in the Midwest. She oversees Howard Brown’s mental health division and also serves as an adjunct professor of psychiatry at Rush University Medical College. The twins are also cofounders of The Institute for Antiracism in Medicine, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the abolition of racism in the medicine field.
The link to the Facebook Live stream will go live on our Facebook page Dec. 14 and 16 at 12:30 p.m. Our written Q&A is continuously updated and the Tribune’ s COVID-19 Information Facebook Group has an ongoing collection of COVID-19 articles. You can submit questions for the doctors at chicagotribune. com/ask.